A Wedding in Green and Silver
by TheColourOfStarlight
Summary: AU. And maybe wedded bliss wasn't for him, after all. [SoraxKairi?]


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**A Wedding in Green and Silver**

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The mirror that stood in the corner was like a relic from a different time, but Sora liked it, maybe for that very reason. Since he had arrived, his gaze had been continually drawn to it, and—finally giving in to his curiosity—he glanced at his reflection one last time. Other than the frown that was wedged onto his face, he looked striking. His suit fit him handsomely and there wasn't a hair out of place.

Well… maybe that part was a lie, but he _had_ tried his hardest. After all, it was his wedding day. But his permanent bed-head of brown hair wasn't what bothered him at the moment. It was the scar across his cheek. It could easily be covered-up with a little make-up. He knew that. In fact, he had concealed the mark for most of his life it seemed, but it still managed to bother him today.

It was quiet in the little dressing room, and the gentle design in olive green that was printed on the wallpaper managed to soothe his nerves. If he closed his eyes and really concentrated, he could make out the prelude music beginning from the sanctuary like a melody from an old music box. It was like he was cut off from the rest of the church, just him and his thoughts. Serene, with the thick sunlight streaming through the window so you could watch the dust floating around him, he was living in his own daydreams.

The ceremony began in less than half an hour; the old clock on the wall told him so. He took in a breath and held it in. When he felt it slide out past his lips, he couldn't help but smile. He was marrying his best friend in the whole world, the red-haired girl of his adolescent dreams—Kairi. Back when he was still just a teenager growing up on his father's farm, he never believed that he would be basking in wedded bliss with someone like Kairi. She had moved out to the countryside with her family when they were kids, and while she was extremely smart and had a taste for the finer things, she never made anyone feel like less. That was what he loved about her.

Sora looked up at the clock again. The minute hand was traveling faster than he would have liked it to, it seemed. (But he couldn't be getting cold feet…) He cleared his mind and tried to think about something else, but nothing sprang to mind. He had blanked. He couldn't remember what day it was, the color of his tie, or even what he had eaten for breakfast that morning. He looked over toward the door longingly. Where was Riku? If any a time he needed his best man, this would be it. He sat down on the floor, not caring about the state of his carefully pressed pants. He felt cold and clammy and… _weird_.

With a million thoughts bubbling just under the surface of his mind, he stood up and went to the door. A quick glance into what was called the "Fellowship Hall" told him that most of the guests were already seated in the sanctuary. After another quick look, he slipped out of his dressing room, rounded the corner into the foyer, and peeked into the bride's dressing room. He knew it was bad luck to see the bride before in wedding (especially in her dress!), but he couldn't help himself. He needed some kind of affirmation. Besides, it was all just superstition anyway.

There was chatter all around as a throng of women buzzed about, making last minute adjustments to frills and make-up in the two mirrors hanging over the lavatory. The bridesmaids weren't much to look at. (Their dresses were like a waterfall of Pepto-Bismol, he decided.) But the bride, Kairi. She looked so… Gorgeous didn't even begin to describe her. She simply radiated beauty.

He slid back into his dressing room before he could be seen by an erstwhile guest or a militant maid-of-honor, feeling a little bit more at ease. With a heavy sigh, he collapsed onto the loveseat that looked across the room. The extra time before the ceremony let his idle thoughts wander back to Riku.

Ever since he was a kid, he had looked up to Riku. Growing up had proven that his best friend was the greatest being alive, no questions asked. Riku won every contest—from seeing who could cut the most wood to who could move the most bales of hay—and he wasn't afraid of anything (not the dark, not heights, not even _beetles_).

Sora had been right behind him his entire childhood. He was always a close second, but he never managed to outdo him. It frustrated him to no end, and when Kairi came along, he thought that he would lose to Riku like he always did. But now he was fixing to marry the girl that he—no, _they_—had longed for. To objectify women (which Sora hated profusely), he had won the prize. And he felt… happy? Scared?

He reached inside his jacket and dug around for his phone, but when his hand felt only fabric, he panicked. In an instant he was up out of his seat, sure that he had dropped it in the hallway or lost it somewhere earlier in the day. He searched all over the floor, desperation sinking in, before he saw it lying innocently enough on an end table.

With a self-conscious laugh, he picked it up and was in the process of dialing Riku's number—he knew it by heart, after all—when the door flew open with a gust of air. Riku and Tidus, another one of his childhood friends, dashed into the room. Riku was in a tuxedo with imperious looking peak lapels, while Tidus was wearing a very dapper suit, though it made his limbs look rather like toothpicks. There was an energy radiating off both of them, but what it was Sora couldn't quite name.

"Why am I so fucking—?" Riku growled. He slammed his fist into the wall, shaking the picture of an ironically serene lake that hung to his right. Sora looked and saw that Riku had been crying. It made him feel very uneasy. Riku never cried. Not even when he fell out of the tree in his family's pasture and broke his arm however many years ago it was. Never.

"Just calm down," his companion said, his sharp tone very uncharacteristic. It was like watching an episode of The Twilight Zone, Sora mused. An alternate reality where Tidus had bite and Riku wasn't, well… _Riku_. Tidus's words, no matter how jarringly out of place Sora thought them to be, did little did calm Riku's emotions.

"It's—I just. It's Sora…" Riku said. Suddenly, his disposition changed. The way he said it gave the brunet chills. It wasn't angry or bitter, but sad, defeated. Not the voice you use when you talk about a groom on his big day, at any rate.

"It's alright. I—I understand what you're going through," Tidus said, his voice was hollow, but not without compassion. Before he could be seen, Sora crawled behind the loveseat. He didn't know how they had missed seeing him when they stormed in, but he was curious to know what they were talking about, especially if it was about him.

"No. You don't." Riku said flatly. "How could you? Why did things have to happen the way they did?" Riku sighed. His ferocity had left him, and now he just stood like an old tree on the verge of tumbling down. He simply stared at the door, and all that Sora could see was his back. Tidus shrugged, more for his own benefit than Riku's.

"I don't know," Tidus mumbled. "Sometimes things happen just because they're supposed to." Suddenly, Sora felt cold again. Tidus walked around and tried to catch Riku's gaze, but the other man simply stared down at an empty point on the wall. Tidus heaved his shoulders and walked away, collapsing on the loveseat with his head in his hand.

"It isn't fair, it isn't right."

Sora peeked out from his hiding place, just past the edge of the furniture. Something had begun to make a light scratching noise, and he was curious to find out what it was. In the mirror, he could make out Riku sullenly adjusting the hair in front of his eyes, while Tidus looked tired. He looked at his own face (for reassurance that this wasn't a dream, he thought to himself), and noticed that his scar had started to bleed.

Funny, because it didn't hurt at all.

"Why did he have to…?" Riku trailed off. Sora listened closer, but the sound of the scratching covered the rest of Riku's words. And then the music in the church must have gotten louder, because Sora could actually hear it from where he was crouched. He looked back at the clock on the wall. The ceremony was about to begin.

Despite the warning signals that were going off in his head, he crawled out from behind the seat and into the open room. Drops of blood had fallen onto his tie, and he had to clean up his face and stop the bleeding before he walked down the aisle. "C'mon guys, it's almost time," he said, practically having to yell to be heard over the scratching. "I need your help for just a sec." He was ignored.

"It's just," Riku continued, "He was engaged. He was supposed to marry her. Not me."

Tidus nodded. "I know," he said, a ghost of a whisper.

"What are you—?" Sora asked. That's when a wave of cold swept over him that knocked him to the ground. Even though he knew better, he wished he hadn't seen the bride in her dress after all, because now he knew what they were talking about, Riku and Tidus. Everything made _sense_. The scar must be from the accident. And maybe this all _was_ just a dream. Because he wasn't getting married to Kairi. Riku was.

And he felt chilled to the bone, absolutely frigid. Because of the scar. No, that's not right, because of the _accident_. He couldn't remember anything, and it made him want to scream, to cry, to punch a hole into the wall so that all the little silver beetles that were trapped back there (and clearly making that infernal scratching sound) could crawl out and finally be free. He started punching his gut over and over in sheer frustration, because he hadn't remembered what day it was, what color tie he was wearing, or even the fact that he was fucking _dead_.

And he fell to the floor. The long shag carpet cushioned his fall. His pants didn't matter now. Nothing did, because _everything_ made sense. And the sound of wedding music began to thunder louder and louder in his ears, as if it was emanating from his very head. And the dust that floated around him began to settle, and everything seemed to blur past him in long glowing streaks. And even though he was cold and the darkness was beginning to overtake him, he wept.

-o-o-o-

**7/16/2013**


End file.
